The Flag We Have in Common
by surffari
Summary: Matthew was a 19-year-old from Toronto. Alfred was a 22-year-old from Kansas. They met at Pride Parade. One-shot, human AU


Our colour was, as some would say, rainbow. We met at Pride.

His name was Alfred, and he wandered up the side of the street with a look on his face that said he didn't have a clue what he was doing. Maybe it was on a whim, or maybe it was the wink I had gotten from a half-naked float-dancer, but I found myself slowly stepping in front of him; looking into the bright blue eyes peeled open behind his glasses, greeting him with a small lopsided smile.

We exchanged awkward "hey"s and "hi"s, and the worrying dent between his eyebrows evened out. I asked if he wanted to watch with me. The relieved sigh that escaped his lips let out a breath he had been holding since about the time he saw me.

He was American. A 22-year-old who didn't know what he was doing with his life and had never personally known a single Canadian. He was raised in Kansas, spent his summers in California, had just recently moved to New York, and could not believe that he would ever be in Toronto—not for Pride in any day.

"So what are you doing here, then?"

An obligatory shrug of his shoulders. "I wanted to meet people. People… like me."

I laughed at the way he was almost afraid to admit he was gay, like it was a sin to even say the word. It was obvious why he was here.

"Why are you here?"

I smiled. "I come every year."

His smiled sparkled more than the glitter left over on the road, so we kept talking.

I remarked on his brown bomber jacket, he said that he saw the temperature was going to be 20 degrees and thought it would be colder. His naivety was almost adorable. As the parade wore on, he laid it on the ground for the two of us to sit on.

He had been wearing a batman shirt underneath the jacket. We compared comics.

He said although he'd never wish for anyone to have to pick their favourite hero (equality and all that), his was Superman. A bashful laughter fell from his lips when I reminded him that Superman was Canadian. It filtered into my ears as easily as the mix of perfumes and colognes into my lungs. I told him that my favourite was Spiderman.

With the end of the parade thinning to a stream down this end of the street and our stomachs and muscles complaining audibly from disuse, we decided that heading out in search of food was a good idea.

"Do you guys have McDonald's in Canada?" he asked.

I turned to him, utterly bewildered. "Is… is there some reason we shouldn't?"

We debated the possibility that there could very well have not been a single McDonald's in Canada; his face lighting up like the CN Tower at night when I finally let him in that yes, there was a McDonald's just around the corner. We raced. He won. I paid.

He spent a total of 5 seconds looking at the menu board before reciting his rather long order from memory. "I'll pay ya back, Mattie. Promise." I chuckled, shook my head and pulled the wallet from my back pocket. He gasped.

It was amazing to him that Canadians did, indeed, use "Monopoly money." It took about five minutes and a Big Mac to extinguish his excitement.

"Hey, Matt… How old are you?"

I smiled up at him, fry almost up to my lips. "19."

"What, really?!"

I laughed. Explaining my current life situation to a near-stranger felt surreal. Mind you, I already knew so much about him. It was only fair.

His one not-so-secret secret was a comic book collection the size of my uncle's old freezer and ticket stubs from every superhero movie he had ever seen taped in a row along his bed frame. My one not-so-secret secret was that I had named a polar bear at the zoo when I was little; I went back every year but I could never remember what his name was (Kumakichi? Kumatroopa? Kumajacko?).

He prayed before bed and went to church every Sunday. I flipped God off every time I tripped on my own shoelace. He was used to the rush of wind in a car, on a motorcycle. I was used to the rush of wind next to the subway, on a bike. He spent every summer surfing. I spent every winter snowboarding.

"Oh, man…" Alfred mused, eyes searching through the window of the fast food restaurant. "You guys have so many cars…"

"Um. Yes."

Still staring out the window, Alfred slid his head down to rest on his elbow. "I was expecting… I dunno…" he mumbled, "dog sleds…"

That comment received exactly what it deserved: a light smack to the head. "We aren't backwards, you dope. We haven't gotten enough snow for that down here in years."

Alfred simply turned and laughed his laugh. I had no idea at the time that I would become addicted to that laugh over the next couple of days. Just like I had no idea he would kiss me the day before he left or that he would call at 2 am in a week's time asking if I'd like to visit him in New York. I had been thinking about him for seven days straight, so of course, what was there to do but say yes.

In another week, six hours and a train ride, I was on the doorstep of Alfred's apartment complex with suitcase and backpack weighing heavily in hand; feeling nervous, tired, and excited all at the same time. I received a bear hug the size of a grizzly, Alfred still dressed in pyjama bottoms as he let me inside. The apartment was a dignified one-bedroom, living room set with a TV and xbox for long gaming nights, kitchen with crusting plates piled in the sink in an attempt to hide the mess. It was simple. It was nice.

He took my hand and lead me all about the apartment, telling me where everything was and what it was, explaining the long categorizing system for his comic books, CDs, DVDs and games. We started on the couch, moved to carpet, and eventually were both laid out like starfish on the wooden floor. We stared up at the ceiling. We talked.

Alfred had had a pretty lonely week coming back. He told me how he'd come out to his friends and though Tony had been giving him the cold shoulder, his other friends accepted him, and Kiku, the one who let him borrow various manga and video games, even asked if he had met someone in Toronto. Alfred got quieter then, avoiding details like he usually didn't and moving on.

He asked how I'd known I was gay. I told him the story of my one and only girlfriend, the beautiful Katyusha, whom I had dated in grade 9. It had been nice and we'd both had fun, but where she had feelings for me, I seemed more inclined towards her brother. She figured it out shortly after I did and we broke it off, but we were still friends to this day.

He asked about my other friends—what they were like. I told him about Lars, the pothead, and the few times I'd had to bail him out. I told him about Gilbert, the brash asshole who could always be counted on to show up at your house drunk. I told him about all of my hockey teammates I saw on the weekend. And finally, I told him about Francis, the pansexual-to-the-core flirt who had taken me to my first Pride Parade and given me tips about all the best bars.

It was easy with Alfred. He told me everything about him, and I wanted to tell him everything about me. I wanted to tell him how my parents had reacted when I first came out, and realized how ironic that was when just the very next day his parents had shown up at his apartment suddenly for a visit.

I had slept on the pullout couch the first night, which was for the best as Alfred's parents arrived just as I had woken up and I still felt entirely groggy until Alfred had introduced me as his friend and I realized something crucial.

Alfred was 22 and still hadn't come out to his parents. Alfred was 22, with a 19-year-old man he had made out with last night sleeping on his couch, and still hadn't come out to his parents. Alfred was 22 with parents Christian to the core and was afraid he would be disowned.

As far as Kansas was concerned, Alfred was the straightest arrow that ever touched the bow. And for me, that was a big problem.

Because I really liked Alfred.

So when he showed us around New York and his parents turned to look at a shop window, I would steal silent kisses and hold hands behind our backs. But Alfred was still nervous, the shine on the back of his neck and the wringing of his shirt hem: the paranoid habits of a man afraid.

His parents left only one day before I did, and the words we'd been holding in for almost a week came tumbling out of both our mouths. His apologies and apologies over and over and my assurances peppering his mind because damn it _we shouldn't be afraid of being in love_ and I told him again and again.

The train ride back to Canada felt to be the second-longest ride I had taken in my life, second only to the time I had beaten up Ludwig at my elementary school for pushing Bella off the playground and my father had driven me home in silence that afternoon. Thoughts of Alfred clung to my mind like cancer.

It took another two weeks of convincing through texts, phone calls and Skype, and I began to get worried when Alfred stopped responding all together for three days. My mind wandered so far I was afraid that I would end up in the psych ward, however there was a single message on my answering machine when I arrived home one overly rainy day.

"Matthew… I'm a bastard."

I nearly ripped the phone from the wall, and I accidentally did just that when I called Alfred back and he still refused to pick up. So I took the new second-longest ride of my life back to New York the next day.

He almost didn't let me up to his apartment.

When he finally did he sank to the floor up against the wall and hid his face. He didn't speak. I sat on the couch watching him for an hour, after which I pulled myself up and did the only thing I could think to do. I made coffee and pancakes. It was a pleasant surprise to find a bottle of real maple syrup—not table syrup—standing proud on the door of the fridge.

"I bought that the day after you left. I remember you saying you hated people who thought maple syrup and table syrup were the same thing."

Alfred was looking up at me, glasses on the floor beside him and eyes swollen, but he was smiling. A little.

"Thank you," I whispered, pouring the syrup onto the top pancake layer and setting it in front of him. "So what happened?"

"Your convincing worked. I went to visit my parents in Kansas."

I waited a moment, but he said nothing, staring down at the plate. "And?"

"They hate me."

Alfred was a mess of tangled hair and red eyes, tears rubbed away the second they formed. But he continued to explain. "They said I'm not their son anymore… that God himself has disowned me… that my existence is a sin and I'm going to hell."

As with every tough event in my life, I didn't know what to say. Alfred's family had crashed down to the reality of his parents' beliefs and I had no idea what could put it back together again. He had no siblings, and now his parents had no son.

So I sat with him. We sat and we talked when he felt he could talk. I held him and all he could say was, "I shouldn't love you, I shouldn't love you," and all I could respond was, "There's nothing wrong with it," somehow wishing I could explain this to his parents.

I knew everything would be okay when we were once again starfish on his floor, discussing Alfred's plans for a giant "peacekeeping" robot.

"Hey, Mattie?"

"Yes, Al?"

"I'm not sure you're really as Canadian as you say you are."

"What?!"

"Yeah. You don't say 'eh' enough."


End file.
